Reducing download traffic for mobile broadband

Virgin are discontinuing prepaid mobile broadband in Australia. Instead of Internet access being "shaped"  to a slower speed when the monthly allocation of data download is used up, there will be an additional charge imposed for each extra gigabyte of data (which happens to be identical to the extra charge imposed by Optus, Telstra and Vodafone). Virgin have offered twice the monthly data allowance for one one dollar extra under a new plan. But a quick calculation of my data use suggests that the new excess charge may double my bill.

To reduce downloads I looked at a few options. One was to reduce access speed at my end of the connection, using something such as "Throttle". But this was fiddly and an inconvenience.

Next I tried compression in the web browser, as that is where most of the downloads happen. Google Chrome Data Saver works well. The compresses the content of the web page. With  Arjun Suresh's Data saver proxy it can even be used with the Firefox browser. But the data saver doesn't work on secure websites and does not make image files significantly smaller. Overall it claims to be saving 30% on my browsing so far.

Most useful has been Bandwidth Hero by Anatoliy Yastreb. This compresses just the images on a web page. It works very large JPEG images. I had to stare at the screen closely to notice the images were slightly blurry, even when using the highest compression setting. Currently this is saving 71% on image downloads. I have only found two problems so far:

1. "Convert to black and white" is on by default. I suggest changing this to "off", as few people will want their web pages in monochrome.
2. The transparent background on some GIF and PNG images comes out as black, making many buttons hard to read. It would be better if the compression process was skipped for GIFs and PNGs (or at least for small ones, or those with transparent backgrounds).

ps:I hadn't noticed Belong have shaping for their two mobile data plans. In the fine print it says:

"You can purchase additional data if your allowance is low or has run out. We do not apply data top-ups automatically.

If you have no data remaining, your service will be slowed to a maximum of 64kbps for the rest of that monthly payment cycle, but we won’t charge you any extra. Your data at the slower speed will be unlimited."

From: https://www.belong.com.au/content/dam/belong/downloads/CIS-Belong-Mobile.pdf

Australia Leading the Americas and the Pacific with Mobile Broadband Speed

Akamai’s State of the Internet Report for the Third Quarter of 2016 indicates Australia is ahead of the Americas and the Pacific with mobile broadband speed (p. 48):

• "Americas: Canada, 8.9 Mbps
• Asia Pacific: Australia, 12.8 Mbps
  
• Europe: United Kingdom, 23.7 Mbps
  
• Middle East/Africa: United Arab Emirates, 13.3 Mbps"

The media coverage of the report in Australia focused on Australia's low global rank for Internet speed of 50th at 9.6 Mpbs. However, the report also points out that Australia has high Long-Term Evolution (LTE) coverage at 98% of the population, compared to 90% for the world (p. 48). The report also points out that only half the Australian population are using this service. However, it may be that Australian telcos and customers are skipping LTE and moving to true 4G. In any case I suggest there is scope for faster broadband access, simply by making mobile broadband more affordable on the devices customers already have and use. While fiber should be laid in the street and into new homes, it may not be worth the cost of retrofitting to existing homes.

Australian Public Wi-Fi Network

In "iiNet plans massive public Wi-Fi network" (IT Wires, 7 January 2014) Graeme Philipson reports that the Western Australia based telecommunication company will expand the WiFi service it provides in the Adelaide CBD to other states. While Phillipson describes this as a "massive" network, it is likely to be confined to city centres and other locations with high concentrations of potential users. In his book "Smart Cities: Big Data, Civic Hackers, and the Quest for a New Utopia" (2013), Anthony M. Townsend, describes how non-profit groups provided such access previously.

It is unlikely iiNet will be providing WiFi broadband access throughout suburbs. However, one option iiNet might like to try is to offer its customers an incentive to provide WiFi to their neighbors. Under such a scheme the customer allows the WiFi on the home broadband to be used by registered users. However, such a scheme would still be limited by the availability of unlicensed spectrum for WiFi. Another option would be to provide 4G picocells, as well as WiFi.

Broadband for Smart Cities

The book "Smart Cities: Big Data, Civic Hackers, and the Quest for a New Utopia" (W. W. Norton & Company, 2013) by Anthony M. Townsend, looks at how cities can use information and communications technology. Townsend covers a lot of territory, looking at cities not only in the USA but in developing nations and issues from security, to the environment. Unfortunately the narrative is a little hard to follow and for the first hundred pages I wondered what the book was about. It was only when Townsend started relating his own experience of building community non-profit WiFi services in New York that the book started to make sense. The heavy emphasis on US developments of technology is also a little distracting. There is barely any acknowledgement that many ICT developments came from elsewhere (for example, the World Wide Web from Europe, the ARM chip from the UK and WiFi from Australia). Townsend raises many issues but then seems to move on to another. This is a useful book to dip into, but frustrating to read from start to finish.

The attempts Townsend relates of communities to provide ubiquitous broadband are very relevant to current Australian discussions of the National Broadband Network (NBN). He relates lobbying of government by telecommunications companies interested in not having a public sector rival. Townsend is suspicious of private company involvement in community networking. He portrays non-profit community providers of broadband in USA as heroes and credits mobile data networks in developing nations with being important in economic development, However, Townsend seems reluctant to acknowledge the role of telecommunications companies in providing wireless broadband in developed nations. There has been a problem that the telcos have charged prices for mobile broadband. For Australia I have suggested that mobile broadband could complement cabled services, with some govenrment intervention.